1. Mineral Resources
  2. Online Spatial Data
  3. Mineral Resource Data System (MRDS)

Dese Creek

Past Producer in Alaska, United States with commodities Gold, Mercury
Map
XML
JSON
KML
C
Sections on this page
  1. Identification information
  2. Geographic coordinates
  3. Site location context
  4. Geographic areas
  5. Commodities
  6. Materials information
  7. Mineral occurrence model information
  8. Nearby scientific data
  9. Economic information about the deposit and operations
  10. Mining district
  11. Links to other databases
  12. Bibliographic references
  13. General comments
  14. Reporter information

Geologic information

Identification information

Deposit ID 10003256
MRDS ID A016078
Record type Site
Current site name Dese Creek

Geographic coordinates

Geographic coordinates: -166.20336, 65.20539 (WGS84)
Relative position Dese Creek is a north-flowing stream whose mouth is on the southeast shore of Grantley Harbor, 7 miles southeast of Teller. As mapped by Sainsbury and others (1969), placer mining operations took place along 1.5 miles of the main drainage at surface elevations of 45 to 180 feet. This is locality 86 of Cobb and Sainsbury (1972). Cobb (1975) summarized relevant references under the name 'Dese Cr.'.

Site location context

Political divisions (FIPS codes)

Nome(Census area)

Alaska(state)

United States(country)

North America(continent)

Land(continent)

USGS map quadrangles

Teller A-3(quadrangle 1:63,360 scale)

Teller SE(quadrangle 1:100,000 scale)

Teller C(quadrangle 1:250,000 scale)

Hydrologic units (watersheds)

Imuruk Basin(hydrologic unit)

Norton Sound(hydrologic accounting unit)

Northwest(hydrologic subregion)

Alaska(hydrologic region)

Federal lands

Teller Native Corporation(ANCSA Village)

ANCSA Village NTVPIC(Type of land area)

NTVPIC(Federal land areas administered by NTVPIC)

Geographic areas

Country State
United States Alaska

Commodities

Commodity Importance
Gold Primary
Mercury Secondary

Materials information

Materials Type of material
Cinnabar Ore
Gold Ore

Mineral occurrence model information

Model code 119
USGS model code 39a
Deposit model name Placer Au-PGE
Mark3 model number 54

Nearby scientific data

(1) -166.20336, 65.20539
ListMap

Economic information

Comments on the geologic information

  • Geologic Description = Bedrock in the Dese Creek drainage is a metapelitic sequence with local metamorphosed mafic intrusive bodies (Sainsbury, 1972). In places, the retrograded greenschist facies mafic bodies preserve remnant blueschist facies minerals. The age of this assemblage is unknown but it is probably Paleozoic. Sainsbury and others (1969) mapped placer workings along 1.5 miles of the main drainage at surface elevations of 45 to 180 feet. Mining took place primarily between 1927 and 1946 and included several years of dredge operations (Cobb, 1975). Heavy mineral concentrates from placer operations contained cinnabar. Sainsbury and others (1969) report anomalous mercury levels in stream sediments above the area of placer operations. The character of the placer deposit has not been described. The area is low enough that Quaternary marine transgressions could have affected the placer deposit.
  • Age = Quaternary

Economic information about the deposit and operations

Development status Past Producer
Commodity type Metallic

Comments on exploration

  • Status = Probably inactive

Mining district

District name Port Clarence

Comments on the production information

  • Production Notes = Not known

Comments on the reserve resource information

  • Reserves = Not defined

Comments on the workings information

  • Workings / Exploration = Placer mining operations, mostly dredging, have taken place along 1.5 miles of the main drainage between surface elevations of 45 and about 180 feet.

Reference information

Bibliographic references

Comments on the references

  • Primary Reference = Sainsbury and others, 1969; Cobb, 1975

General comments

Subject category Comment text
Deposit Model Name = Alluvial Au placer (Cox and Singer, 1986; model 39a)

Reporter information

Type Date Name Affiliation Comment
Reporter 10-MAY-1998 Travis L. Hudson Applied Geology

Beyond USGS

Supplemental information added by qvyshift.com. Not part of the original USGS MRDS record.

Maps centered on this site

Authoritative Alaska resources

These are landing pages for further research — the state agencies don't currently expose per-mine deep links.